GSD Launches New Track

The Harvard Graduate School of Design may soon bring new meaning to the term “green room” with the unveiling of its newest concentration on sustainable design.

The concentration will be offered within the school’s one-and-a-half-year Master in Design Studies (MDesS) program.

Sustainable Design—one of five MDesS concentrations—focuses on strategies and technologies for constructing ecologically balanced and energy and resource-efficient design.

The Design School postponed full execution of the program, which had been in the works for several years, until it had recruited enough faculty with expertise in the field of sustainability, said Martin Bechthold, the co-director of MDesS.

Keeping in mind factors such as occupant satisfaction, acoustics, and lighting, students research sustainability measures for urban neighborhoods, landscapes, and specific buildings and products, according to Bechthold.

The concentration will encourage students “to think through the perspectives of ecology and sustainability as opportunities for innovation,” said Dean of the Graduate School of Design Mohsen Mostafavi.

The new concentration follows Harvard’s growing commitment to sustainability and the environment. As the University expands into Allston over the next 50 years, it has committed that all buildings and landscapes will conform with the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design.

The concentration complements the “ethical imperative” to preserve the environment with practical design techniques that encourage students to pursue “new kinds of imagination, new kinds of possibilities, new sorts of environments,” Mostafavi said.

Students are taught to think beyond simply drawing a building onto a piece of paper, said associate professor of architectural technology Christoph Reinhart. They must consider the ramifications of their designs, particularly energy expenditure, he added.

“The dilemma in designing energy-efficient buildings is to maintain a comfortable environment for occupants while at the same time reducing the amount of energy needed to maintain it,” Bechthold said.

Though the new concentration is listed under the MDesS—a post-professional, non-studio degree program—courses in Sustainable Design are open to students outside of MDesS.

Students petitioned to participate in the concentration’s debut this fall, but beginning next year, students must apply for admission, Bechthold said.

“We’ll go out and look for people interested—which we’ll probably not have to do because there’s a lot of demand,” he said.

Mostafavi said that with the introduction of the new concentration, MDesS is a more interdisciplinary field that will encourage “a mode of thinking that crosses a variety of different boundaries.”

Undoubtedly, Bechthold said, students will enter the field with interests ranging from architecture to real estate to consulting in energy design.

“We see really synergy between this concentration and other programs,” Bechthold said. “We want to make this interesting for a wide range of people of different backgrounds.”

—Staff Writer Esther I. Yi can be reached at estheryi@fas.harvard.edu.